


it's little, and broken, but still good

by magisterequitum



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Gen, s2 AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-24
Updated: 2013-02-24
Packaged: 2017-12-03 13:04:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/698554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magisterequitum/pseuds/magisterequitum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>S3 au, in which Jenna's left to piece the Gilberts back together and hold onto everything she can. AU from 2.20 onward.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it's little, and broken, but still good

**Author's Note:**

> Clearly what to do when we get sad no more Gilberts but Elena left feelings from S4, we go all the way back to S2 and reset it. So here, this fic operates under the illusion that the elixir works, Jenna isn't used, and things go differently.

Jenna paces the living room, making turns at the bookshelf and the fireplace and an absent hand trailing the couch as she walks around its shape. She's bitten half her fingernails off, the tips jagged now. Her hair's a tangled mess too from where she's tunneled fingers through the locks and pulled and twisted the strands. Currently, she's moved to biting her bottom lip, pulling the dead skin away and making her lips bleed. The salty tang is somehow comforting to her in this state. 

 

The house is too quiet and she can feel a scream burning its way up her throat. 

 

Her head jerks to the left as the front door open. She takes two steps forward and then stops, her mouth falling open at the two figures and Elena in Jeremy's arms. "Oh god," she whimpers. 

 

"She's fine, Jenna." John tries to say, one hand resting on Elena's head, the other on Jeremy's shoulder. 

 

Her fingers shake and she moves, needing to see, afraid to touch but needing to. Close enough now she can see the dirt and blood smeared across the still and pale neck. Her fingers flutter as she reaches out to touch, feeling the rise and fall of Elena's chest. 

 

"She's okay," Jeremy repeats John's words. "She's just exhausted." 

 

Jenna feels anger burn through her for a moment. Bright and hot, flaring up at the fact that they'd all lied to her, all kept her in the dark, all kept her here, locked away and unable to do anything, feeling desperate and shaky. It dissipates though at the sight of Elena. "Let's clean her up," she says instead. 

 

Later, when she herself showers and cleans away the desperation and fear and sweat from her skin, she screams silently as the water spills over into her mouth. 

 

 

 

"You have to tell me everything." 

 

Jenna says this the next morning. She's been in the kitchen for an hour already, trying to make the perfect pot of coffee for when Elena wakes up again because she's certain that she'll want that and that's something she can give her. She rounds on John when he enters, slinking into the room from where he'd set up in Grayson's old office on the futon there. 

 

He opens his mouth to object, and she narrows her eyes, a sharp jerk of her head and her muscles all pulling tight. "No. Now. All of it." 

 

John blinks, casting his eyes upward to roof of the first floor. "Alright."

 

She sits at the table and listens as he tells her everything. About the Gilbert history she'd never known, about the things that went bump in the dark, all the things that modern pop culture and media got wrong, how beautiful and blonde little Caroline Forbes, who she'd babysat with Elena now drank blood to live, how Elena wasn't just a free young girl but something made for creatures to prey on and use, how Alaric had died, how Elena wasn't dead and just exhausted upstairs. She listened and her hands shook on the kitchen island's marble. 

 

To his credit, John doesn't try to reach for her hands. 

 

 

 

Later, she's there when Elena wakes. She's reading Lord of the Flies in the window seat, waiting and not really paying attention to the pages or the text. A startled gasp and choking whimper and she's up and on the bed, reaching out to touch Elena and draw her into the present. 

 

"It's okay, Elena, it's okay," she says, running her hands down her niece's arms, trying to soothe her. 

 

Elena's eyes are wide and white before her face crumples, folds in on itself, a small child once again. "I'm sorry," she cries, collapsing into Jenna's waiting arms. "I'm so sorry." 

 

In the awkward position she's in, Jenna holds her as tight as she can, uncaring of the protest of her body. She can't let go. 

 

 

 

She hates this church she decides. Sitting there watching the town residents try to say some things about Alaric, Elena on her left and Jeremy on her right, both of them gripping her hands tight, she hates this church. 

 

Her dress pulls too tight on her shoulders and her mascara is itchy on her eyelashes. She probably needs to buy a new one, she absently thinks. 

 

She doesn't cry. Not even when the dirt gets put over the coffin and the grave covered up. 

 

 

 

"No more lying," Jenna says once they're in the kitchen again. Where once they'd used this place for laughter and jokes and early morning teasing and experiments in cooking dinner, now it's become the place for serious talk and orders. 

 

Elena and Jeremy sit across from her on the barstools, faces open and young and so sorry, and again Jenna wonders if she's doing the right thing, if she even knows what she's doing at all. All evidence points that she doesn't, but God she's trying. 

 

They nod at her, murmured apologies in the soft morning light and the cars that drive past. There's a mountain of casserole dishes on the side and someone made them a loaf of homemade zucchini bread too. Thankfully, people have stopped coming by. She's not sure if she can take anymore apologies for Alaric, sincere or false, and she's not sure if she even wants to dwell on it longer. She's pushed her mind to think of other things instead.

 

Of course, John chooses that moment to walk back into the house, announcing his presence and intent to stay. 

 

 

 

"What do you mean you're staying?" 

 

"That is what I just said, didn't I? I don't understand." 

 

Jenna's sure her face looks comical right now, but there's nothing of humor or laughter in her. "Yeah, I got that, jackass. What I don't get is what you mean by you're actually staying or think you can." 

 

She nearly feels sorry for her vehement words when John's face falls, eyes blinking and confusion and hurt there looking at her. He stares at her and she can nearly hear his reply already. Where else would I go? You all need me, maybe not want, but definitely need. And maybe that's true and maybe she's not that cruel. 

 

She exhales, sighing out and tapping her knuckles against the counter. "Alright. Fine. But only if Elena and Jeremy are okay with it. And you don't get to tell me what to do with them." 

 

They've already got a messed up life, what did it matter if they combined together to have one messed up family with a messed up life in a messed up town. 

 

 

 

She sits against Elena's headboard and lets the girl curl around her, stroking her hair like Miranda used to do to Jenna herself. 

 

"I'm okay," Elena promises. She looks like Miranda too when she turns her up and tilts her chin up to see her. "I'm just, kind of tired. Spending so many weeks and so much time preparing for Klaus and now it's all kind of gone." 

 

"Yeah?" Jenna answers, her question rising upwards, an open invitation but not pressuring, because Elena hadn't divulged much beyond that which was necessary. Her diary held the answers, Jenna had seen her writing in it, but she'd never read it. She could be patient. 

 

Elena chews on her lower lip, and for a minute Jenna thinks she's just going to stay silent. She doesn't though, her mouth opening and everything spilling out in shaky breathes and a voice that tries to stay even and firm. 

 

Jenna doesn't talk, she makes sure to listen. She cards her fingers through Elena's hair and just listens and takes the solid weight of her against her. 

 

 

 

"What are they doing?" 

 

Elena takes a sip from her coffee mug before answering, "Practicing shooting vampires." She says it in the way that supposedly it's common knowledge what John and Jeremy are doing in the backyard with a crossbow. 

 

It hits Jenna then that it is supposed to be common knowledge now to her. 

 

She's profoundly grateful that the neighbors are away on vacation and can't actually see. But then maybe they don't actually really care. 

 

They look out the dining room window, watching as the bolt misses the target by a good foot. 

 

Jenna grimaces. "He's not very good at it." 

 

"Why do you think I came in here?" Elena snorts and takes another swallow from her mug. It's cracked and chipped, but it's one Grayson used to drink from it. 

 

Jenna glances at Elena from the corner of her eye, keeping her face on the window. She'd asked Elena specifically if she'd minded John staying with them for some time, and while Elena's mouth had pursed and her eyes had narrowed, she'd nodded and said it was fine. So far, Jenna hadn't seen her with John all that much, but that she'd gone outside to stand with them meant enough. "You missed dinner last night." 

 

A sheepish look that is far too much like when Jenna used to get caught sneaking back in late from hanging out with the Fells in high school. "Sorry. I was with Bonnie and Caroline." 

 

"Oh," she shakes her head. "That's fine. I just was a little worried. That's all. I thought you were somewhere else." 

 

Elena blinks and tilts her head, recognition dawning. "You thought I was with Stefan?"

 

"I don't mind," she's quick to say. Outside, Jeremy misses again and she watches John go to retrieve it, chastising over his shoulder. "I just don't know-"

 

"We're not," Elena interrupts. She swallows and frowns, closing her eyes and then opening them, a quick little shake of her head. "I haven't been over there lately. Stefan's dealing with some things. Some issues with himself. I think he might leave for a little while, with Damon." 

 

Jenna's not sure what that means. She only remembers what Elena had told her, that Stefan had problems with blood and that they'd tried to make him stronger and under control by using Elena's blood. She chews on her lip. "Are you okay with that?" 

 

"I'm okay." It's the not same parroting that she's heard Elena repeat to strangers before. It's honest. She shrugs her shoulders. "It'll be okay. He'll come back, he said." 

 

She figures if Elena wants to tell her more, she will. She's trying not to pry. And maybe it'll be for the best. She can't help the selfishness in her that wants to hold Elena to her and keep her from everything.

 

A shout comes from outside and they both turn in time to see Jeremy nearly impale John on accident. 

 

Jenna hums in the back of her throat. "Maybe I should give it a whirl." 

 

 

 

Jeremy's helping her cook dinner, his sketches covering up the island as well, mixed in with the lasagna noodles drying on paper towels, when the front door bangs open and Elena and John come spilling in. Both are competing to see who can be the loudest, shouts reverberating down the foyer. 

 

"You do not get to tell me what to do," Elena yells, hair flying around her face as she whirls around on the bottom of the stairs. Her face is livid, her lips drawn back in her anger. 

 

John's eyes are narrowed, his hands by his side, cool anger in the face of a screaming teenager. Jenna ducks her head around in time to see him respond with, "They're dangerous to you-"

 

"They are my bestfriends and I am not going to stop hanging out with them just because you hate everything supernatural."

 

"Elena-"

 

"No," Elena shouts and Jenna's too frozen in the entryway with Jeremy behind her to stop what happens next. "You aren't my father, you don't get to tell me what to do." 

 

Thundering of footsteps on the stairs and the slamming of a door and Elena's gone. 

 

"What happened?" Jeremy asks next to her, confusion and a hint of anger in his voice. 

 

"John?" Jenna asks, taking a step forward. 

 

John ignores them both. He gives them one look and then retreats towards Grayson's study, closing the door behind him. 

 

 

 

That night only Jeremy and Jenna eat dinner, silence stretching in the house as they sit at the too large dining table. 

 

She eats lasagna with too hard edges and salad and feels the weight of it all sink back down at her. She'd thought they'd been better, thought they'd been getting somewhere, but all of it's unraveling. 

 

 

 

She lies in bed later and listens as Elena's door opens and her footsteps are quiet on the stairs. For a minute she's certain that Elena's going to leave, sneak out, go back to Bonnie or Caroline's place, but then she hears the knock on the study door and exhales in relief. 

 

It's not for her to interfere, it's something they'll have to talk about between the two of them. 

 

No one ever said it would be easy.

 

 

 

A man with sharp teeth tries to rip out her throat at the annual Lockwood fall party. 

 

She trips on the ground and scuttles backwards, a scream rising up in her throat. She's seen Caroline's vampire face, curiosity one evening with all the girls over at their house, and knows instantly that it's a vampire in front of her. Not someone she recognizes at all though, a stranger. 

 

A gun fires out, several rapid shots that nearly deafen her eardrums. 

 

The man falls over, face down in the dirt, and then the shadowed figure the she'd only just saw over the vampire's shoulder comes closer and drops down to her. John's fingers curl over her upper arms, pulling her up into him and sitting upright. He moves her hair out of her face, peering close at her. "Are you okay?"

 

Jenna wants to laugh because that seems to be the word they keep trading around in the house to ask one another. Instead, her breath comes out sharp and quick and she holds tight to him, digging her nails into his pants. Her knee's skinned under her dress. "Jesus christ."

 

"The Council will deal with this," John mutters, looking away from her quickly towards the Lockwood house and where everyone else is. 

 

Her voice a bit firmer, she shakily says, "You're going to have to teach me to fight."

 

He swings his gaze back to her. His eyes are too bright in the moonlight and his fingers spasm a bit on her skin. He swallows. "Alright." 

 

 

 

She's working on her thesis one night in bed. 

 

The house is alive with noises. She can hear Jeremy listening to his music in his room. She can hear too the quiet sounds of John and Elena talking downstairs. More so Elena talking to him and John listening. She catches vague mentions of English and writing and some author she's not sure about. 

 

It's nice. 

 

 

 

They're all four of them eating at the Grill one night and it's the strangest thing Jenna thinks has happened in a long time because they're all smiling, no one's yelling, they're even laughing, and talking about mundane things. 

 

"You know Christmas is close." 

 

The conversation halts and all three of them stare at Elena who's brought it up. It's indeed true, now that Jenna thinks about. She's been so busy trying to wrap up her thesis that she'd forgotten about the time of year. 

 

Jeremy makes a face and stabs part of his chicken. He grunts. "Does this mean we have to go back over for the Lockwood Holiday Extravaganza?" 

 

"The last time we were there I nearly was dinner." Jenna takes a sip from her water, giving them all a look with raised eyebrows. Plus, she's not sure she wants to spend an evening with Carol hounding her on not raising Elena and Jeremy right. 

 

"We," Elena starts to say, slowly and while watching them all. "Could go to the lake house? Like we used to?" 

 

The table seems to freeze, everyone pausing and digesting what she'd just said. Jenna glances at John across from her and Jeremy next to her, seeing their darting looks. "If that's what you'd want to do? I think we'd all be okay with that?" 

 

Elena smiles tentatively, moving her shoulders a bit. "I think it could be good." 

 

"Alright," she says. "That's what we'll do." 

 

 

 

Jenna comes home from the college one Thursday in January to find Elena on the front porch with a tall blonde. They're seated on the porch swing, rocking back and forth, textbooks between them. 

 

"Hello," the girl says, a too bright smile on her face. 

 

Jenna stares at the girl, noting the far too obvious foreign accent. "Hi," she says back, the one syllable word drawled out. 

 

"Rebekah's new at school, Aunt Jenna. I'm helping her." Elena smiles, and her face is honest, no hint of worry on it. 

 

Some mental warning goes off in her head though, but a quick glance down tells her that Elena's got her vervain bracelet from Jeremy on. "Okay, have fun. I'll be inside." 

 

She closes the front door behind her, setting her back down, only to find John and Jeremy bent over the couch so they can see out the blinds. "Who the hell is Rebekah? And what are you two doing?"

 

Jeremy makes a shushing noise. "She can hear you." 

 

"Who?" She's officially confused, even more so. 

 

He shushes her again. "Rebekah can hear you." 

 

She puts the dots together now, suddenly super grateful that she'd glanced down to check Elena's wrist. "Okay," she whispers, not even sure if that will help but what the hell. "Why is there a vampire on the front porch that we don't know?" She can see from John's profile that he's grinding his teeth. 

 

"Because Elena didn't want to invite her in since we all live here too. She thought it might be rude to us. And unsafe." Jeremy rolls his eyes before going on. "She's Elijah's sister." 

 

Jenna freezes, her eyes narrowing and her mouth twisting at the memory of the man she'd thought was only interesting in Founding Family lore but had actually turned out to be the oldest vampire around and had been working with Elena on sacrificing her to kill his brother. She should have known that no one was that interested in Mystic Falls history. She feels a pang of longing for Alaric then, sudden and fleeting, but there. 

 

Jeremy grimaces at her expression, or what her face must look like, giving her a sheepish look. "She says we should be nice to her because she's kind of nice and Elijah did save her life."

 

She thinks maybe she and Elena will have to have another talk on being nice to people. And then she thinks she might be turning more into John each day. 

 

John just grinds his teeth even more. 

 

She's unable to keep herself from laughing at him. 

 

 

 

It's like a redux of months before, guys in the backyard and girls in the dining room. 

 

"I don't understand," Rebekah says, frowning and gazing out to where Jeremy's winding the crossbow up. Jenna had invited her because she did so enjoy watching John's face draw up as he glared at everyone in the room. It's the same reason that Elijah's in the backyard as well, looking as out of place as ever in his suit. Their being in the house bring her no end of delight, and hey, she needs her kicks where she can get them. 

 

"Just wait for it," Caroline and Bonnie say at the same time. 

 

They all make appreciative noises of understanding when Matt nearly loses his hand. 

 

"Oh, I see now." 

 

 

 

Jenna sits on the couch and watches as Elena and Jeremy trade hits, fighting over the ice cream bowls that lay forgotten on the coffee table. John's spread out on the single chair, notes from the Council with the latest issue and notes from Elena's latest story, something she won't share with anyone else, mixing together. She's got her laptop herself whirring away on her knees. 

 

The cars pass outside, the TV bleats on with some old sitcom, and there are no casserole dishes on the counter.

 

She smiles and then frowns as Jeremy yelps when Elena dumps him onto the floor. 

 

She just rolls her eyes and leaves it to them. See, she's cool.


End file.
